During September 2012, pollution closed 10 miles of West Sussex beaches on the south coast for four days.
Raw sewage had been pumped into the sea, affecting beaches from Southwick to Ferring, near Worthing. Within hours of the untreated sewage being pumped into the sea a slick of pollution was visible and the bathing beaches were closed to protect the public.
Investigations revealed that the sewage had been pumped into the sea by Southern Water, who stated that they had experienced a pump failure, which had never happened before. Three blocked pumps at Southern Water’s East Worthing wastewater treatment works were to blame for the incident.
According to the company, they were faced with a major emergency and the decision to release the raw sewage into the sea was taken because the felt that it was the lesser of two evils.
Southern Water contested that they had had no option but to institute emergency procedures and discharged the sewage into the sea to avoid it backing up in the sewer network and avoid properties such as Worthing Hospital being flooded, which would have put lives at risk. The company denied three charges of breaching environmental regulations and was cleared in July this year of charges relating to the proper maintenance of equipment on the direction of a judge at Chichester Crown Court.
On the 4th of August, however, the company was found guilty of breaching environmental regulations and sentencing for these breaches will be passed at a later date.
After the verdict the company apologised unreservedly to the customers and businesses who may have been affected by the incident and added that it had since invested £20m on making improvements at the company and had also installed back-up systems to help reduce the risk of any future emergencies.
Living-Water is a London water cooler supplier. Get office water delivered to your business from London water delivery company.
